New Earth (TV story)
New Earth 'is the first episode of the second series of ''Doctor Who. It was written by Russell T. Davies, directed by James Hawes and featured David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor and Billie Piper as Rose Tyler. Overview To be added Synopsis The Doctor takes Rose to see the Planet New Earth, colonised by the human race since the destruction of the original planet Earth. On arriving the Doctor receives an invitation to visit a hospital run by the Sisters of Plenitude, a sisterhood of cat-women nuns who have the uncanny ability to cure so many long thought incurable diseases. But as the Doctor and Rose discover there is a sinister method as to how the Sisterhood manage to develop such cures. While unknown to them both an old enemy thought to be deceased, awaits the Time Lord and his companion. Plot While Rose bids her mother Jackie and Mickey farewell, the Doctor starts powering up the TARDIS engines. After saying her goodbyes, Rose joins him in the ship as it takes off; the Doctor joyously tells her that they’re heading “further than they’ve ever gone before”. Before long, the TARDIS lands and upon exit, the Doctor introduces Rose to New Earth, a technologically advanced planet and the second home of the human race. As they dash off to explore, they are observed by a tattooed man watching them through a robot spider. Stopping to rest, the Doctor recounts their adventure wherein they saw the destruction of the original Earth and explains that after humanity left for space, they decided to find a new home and settled on a world almost identical to Earth. While they talk, the spider continues to monitor them; when they head towards a hospital from which the Doctor received an invite on his psychic paper, it’s revealed they’re being watched by Cassandra, still alive after her apparent death before. Arriving at the hospital, run by a number of cat-like novices, the Doctor hops in a lift to Ward 26; Rose misses the lift and gets in another one when it is overridden by the tattooed man and called downwards. After receiving a disinfectant shower (to the Doctor’s enjoyment and Rose’s surprise and beguilement), Rose winds up in the basement and discovers Cassandra and her tattooed clone-servant Chip watching an old film of her. Upstairs, the Doctor is escorted to the ward by Sister Jatt where he finds the patient that summoned him, the Face of Boe; Novice Hame sadly tells him that he is dying of old age. Meanwhile, Cassandra explains that her brain was salvaged from Platform One where she was restored and smuggled into the hospital basement by Chip, who steals medicines for her; she also voiced suspicion that the sisters are concealing something. Rose tried to leave, but she is restrained by a stream of energy; using a psychograft, Cassandra forces her consciousness into Rose’s body. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Hame talk about a story of the Face of Boe that before his death, he would impart his great secret to ‘a traveller, the man without a home, the lonely god’. Downstairs, Cassandra examines herself in Rose’s body before notice her original skin and brain are dead. Accessing Rose’s memories, she learns about the Doctor and his recent regeneration and suddenly calls on Rose’s phone. Cassandra passes herself of as Rose as best she can when he is suddenly drawn away by the sudden miraculous recovery of another patient when his treatment shouldn’t have been possible; he tries to pry the truth out of Matron Casp when she pulled away by Sister Jatt to attend to a problem in Intensive Care. Believing the Doctor can help discover the Sisterhood’s secrets, Cassandra heads up to meet him, concealing a special perfume in Rose’s cleavage before heading up. In Intensive Care, Jatt and Casp examine an apparent patient sealed inside one of a row of green cubicles. They are shocked by its lifelike developments but incinerate him when they leave. Cassandra finds the Doctor looking at all the medicinal solutions in the ward, unable to understand how they are able to conceive it all. He almost catches on to Cassandra but she forces him into a kiss and breaks his train of thought. Hacking into a terminal, the Doctor and Cassandra discover a hidden entrance to Intensive Care, where they find a giant, underground complex of green cubicles, each one housing a patient infected with every disease in the galaxy. The Doctor is sickened by the Sisterhood growing humans to experiment on; Novice Hame interrupts him, having followed, and defends the actions of the Sisterhood, but he furiously rebuffs her claims and declares that he’s shutting down the whole operation. He also demands to know what the Sisterhood has done to Rose, having clocked that something was wrong with her when the plight of the patients didn’t phase her. With her cover blown, Cassandra shows her hand, knocking the Doctor out with the concoction hidden down her front and triggers an alarm. Sealing the Doctor in the empty cubicle, Cassandra tries to ransom with Casp and Jatt, demanding money in exchange for her silence over the Intensive Care operation. When they refuse, she gives all the patients a shot of adrenaline and releases them all from the cubicles. As they advance, one patient triggers a power surge that releases every patient in the complex. The patients advance further; Casp gets clear but Jatt is infected with all their diseases with just one touch. The Doctor and Cassandra flee from the approaching hoard when Casp places the entire hospital under quarantine. As the patients start infecting everyone else, the Doctor and Cassandra barricade themselves in the basement. He orders her to leave Rose’s body, to which she responds but possessing his. As Rose regains awareness, the patients burst in, forcing Rose and Cassandra to climb the lift shaft to escape. They are intercepted by Casp, who accuses them of destroying everything; suddenly, she is grabbed by a patient and infect before she plummets back down the shaft to her death. Making it to the top of the shaft, Cassandra doesn’t know how to open the door with the sonic screwdriver and goes back into Rose so the Doctor can do it. However, he refuses until she leaves Rose and she goes back into him. This continues until Cassandra willingly enters a patient so the Doctor would open the door before entering Rose’s body again at the last second. Returning to Ward 26 with the remaining uninfected patients, the Doctor orders everybody to get him the intravenous solutions for every disease. Gathering them up and tying them to himself, the Doctor jury rigs a zip line to the bottom of the lift shaft. As the patients breach the ward, everyone evacuates, leaving a reluctant Cassandra to accompany the Doctor in rocketing down to the bottom of the shaft. Mixing all the solutions into a large vat, the Doctor jumps into the lift and opens the doors, calling all the patients to him. As they approach, the disinfection comes on and soaks all the infected patients, who start passing on the solutions to each other and they are soon all cured from the diseases. The Doctor shows Cassandra the results of their labours, an entirely new species of human, pure and free of all sickness. Later, when the quarantine is lifted, the remaining Sisterhood are arrested for their actions and the Doctor goes to speak to the Face of Boe. Promising they will meet one last time and that will be when he reveals his final truth, he teleports away. Turning his attention back to Cassandra, the Doctor orders her to leave Rose where a substitute body will be built and she can stand trial, but Cassandra just cries that she will ultimately die. Their argument is interrupted by Chip, who hid in one of the cubicles during the chaos and offers his body for Cassandra to possess. As soon as she does, Chip’s heart starts to fail and Cassandra makes peace that they will both soon die. As a final act of kindness, the Doctor and Rose take Cassandra back to her past where Cassandra tells her former self that she looks beautiful before keeling over and dying. As the younger Cassandra cradles Chip’s body, unaware it was herself that just passed, the Doctor and Rose take moment to watch before silently walking away. Cast * The Doctor - David Tennant * Rose Tyler - Billie Piper * Jackie Tyler - Camille Coduri * Mickey Smith - Noel Clarke * Cassandra - Zoe Wanamaker * Chip - Sean Gallagher * Matron Casp - Dona Croll * Duke of Manhattan - Michael Fitzgerald * Fran Clovis - Lucy Robinson * Sister Jatt - Adjoa Andoh * Novice Hame - Anna Hope * Patient - Simon Ludders * Face of Boe - Struan Rodger Crew To be added References To be added Story Notes To be added Continuity To be added Home video and audio releases To be added External Links * Official ''New Earth'' page on '''Doctor Who Website